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A bunch of bull(s)

I’d like to file a complaint with Mother Nature. This is winter, is it not? What the heck is with the 50 degree rain?

I felt very prepared going into December. I dusted off my down jacket and stocked up on extra scarves and mittens. I even acquired a pretty snazzy hat to keep my ears warm. In the process, I packed away my umbrella. Apparently, that was a mistake.

I’ve been looking forward to snow shoeing and snowmobiling, but those hopes were dashed when I left my house yesterday morning. I couldn’t believe how much beautiful snow had melted over night.

I was a little cranky about the whole thing, I’ll admit. But thanks to the EPA, I now have someone (or something) to blame. Cow emissions. Apparently these flatulent, belching beasts are behind it all.

I’m all for placing blame, believe me. But this is ridiculous.

Is going after corporate polluters too much of a challenge for our federal regulators? Farmers probably do have fewer high power attorneys.

What would the effect be on Upstate New York? Our economy is already struggling, and farmers in particular have it tough. Add a per-head surcharge or tax on dairy cows and what will happen? Farms will go out of business, families will lose their livelihood and we’ll lose a part of our agricultural heritage. In other words, it would be devastating to our communities.

Oh, AND we’ll have to pay more for milk and other dairy products.

How about state revenues? They have already taken a reported 20 percent hit from Wall Street’s foundering financial giants. The dairy industry may make up a smaller piece of the overall pie, but it’s a slice none the less.

The surcharge would also, no doubt, have a pronounced effect on the U.S. beef industry. But, if you’ll remember their “Beef, it’s what’s for dinner” advertising campaign a few years ago, they do have a little more money to work with. And probably the high powered attorneys and lobbyists to go with it. Not so, our little New York dairy farmers.

And other farm animals could be taxed as well.

Now the EPA has started to deny the whole thing, blaming it on a USDA report. But with the number of elected officials weighing in on the subject, I find it hard to believe that it’s all the product of their overactive imaginations. Next the EPA will be making allegations that all the methane is killing brain cells on Capitol Hill.

Then I put on my conspiracy theory hat (no, not that cute winter one I was talking about).

What if this is some complicated plot by extremist vegetarians!

Frustrated in their attempt to decimate the poultry industry with the avian flu outbreaks, their most recent plot against Irish pig farmers and that whole mad cow thing, they have changed their strategy.

They’ve now joined forces with PETA. After convincing their new allies to stop slinging red paint at the fur-clad elite, the two are now taking aim at the farming industry so heartlessly raising these beasts for slaughter.